A moving novel of unconditional love and the freedom of letting go, this story follows the haunting journey of a single mother from South Carolina who discovers she's pregnant again.

When single mother Priscilla Lynn Macy learns she's having another child unexpectedly, she packs the family into the car to escape. Eight-year-old Janie Doe and Rainey Dae, her seventeen-year-old sister with special needs, embark on the last family vacation they'll ever take with Poppy and Grandma Mona in the back seat.

The trip seems aimless until Janie realizes they are searching for the father who left them years ago. When they can't find him, they make their way to Forest Pines, SC. Priscilla hasn't been to her family home in many years and finds it a mixed blessing of hope, buried secrets, and family ghosts.

Through eyes of innocence, Janie learns the hard realities of life and the difficult choices grownups make. And she must face disturbing truths about the people she loves in order to carry them in the moments that matter most.

Part road trip, part mystery, and completely unexpected, Saving Cicadas picks you up in one place and puts you down someplace else entirely. It's an eloquent reminder that life is a miracle—and even the smallest soul is a gift.

• Haunting contemporary southern fiction


• Includes discussion questions for book clubs


• Also by Nicole Seitz: The Inheritance of Beauty, A Hundred Years of Happiness, and Trouble the Water